Is it certain? Call the priest – it’s time to bury text blogging, isn’t it?

You wish!

As a marketing instrument, texts will live long afar virtual reality and live streams.

And that is why.

When We Watch Videos

A human brain has invented spaceflights and neural network technologies, but we’re still little different from our ape-man predecessors. Since day one, we processed visual information better, especially when supported by sounds.

Put it bluntly, it’s easier for us to watch videos, so we opt for this type of content.

But does “easier” equal “better”? Don’t we turn into lazy, sleepy cats if choosing simple over needed?

Videos convey emotions. Attracted by instinct, we watch and respond to a video of dancing cats regardless its irrationality.

Videos are personalistic. We look for an eye contact reflexively because it’s easier to trust someone when you see their face. That’s why explainer videos sell more.

Watching videos and reading texts involve different cognitive functions. So before joining the club of video content fans, marketers should understand what effect they want to achieve: a short-term emotional feedback or deep embedding into consumers’ thinking and behavior.

Millennials Choose Texts

According to Pew Research Center, 42% of young adults prefer reading the news, compared to 38% of those who would rather watch it.

41% find it more comfortable to read than watch.

19% believe that videos don’t add any useful information to the news.

35% will choose texts over videos with ad pre-rolls.

So what if videos aren’t so popular as they’re trying to bring home? What if that’s marketers who make noise over this content type for profit, not consumers who need it for fair?

9 Reasons Why Text Blogging Leaves Video Behind

It’s checkable. Tons of online content is stolen, paraphrased, and claimed as own, but texts are harder to pirate than videos. Copy Scape, Plagiarism Check, and other corresponding services allow checking blog posts for duplication and find out if they are original.

It makes us think. When lazy and relaxed, people are more likely to click on videos to get the point. But when they want to study a problem from all sides, they’ll read blog posts or check lists of valuable resources to condense down.

It’s a space saver. Text files work for any data storage device. We can upload them fast, and they don’t require media players to open and review.

It’s persuasive. When reading a sales copy on screen or paper, we are kind of listening to own voice. We speak through arguments and agree with a brand’s message by instinct.

It’s share-friendly. One can’t copy-paste a video or its part to share with friends. The same can’t be said for word-oriented blog posts.

It’s time-comfortable. We pause, reread a paragraph for a dozen times, and work with the information at own pace. In contrast, videos make us follow their pace and don’t allow to take a breath. Sure, one can press a pause button and re-watch but, frankly speaking, it’s not so time-comfortable to do.

It’s printable! This great feature of texts allows perceiving the information from another angle and editing it the way we need. We take a pen, cross out wateriness, underline key theses, make marginal notes, etc. Would you try the same with videos?

It’s scannable. Users don’t read but scan online information, and it’s more comfortable to do when seeing the full document at once. Based on what we get through scanning, we decide whether the content is worth our time. This trick doesn’t work for videos: to find out if it’s meaningful, we have to delve into it.

It’s foreseeable. Videos are hard to get at once, and that’s a big problem. The topic seems interesting and visual imagery is fair, but something is missing. We watch, wait for this missing, and… waste time. It’s not going to happen with texts, as visual effects and emotions can’t hide poor content there.

That is why most blogs support their videos with word oriented content.

“So, what shall I do?”

A video is a great instrument of digital marketing: it allows to demonstrate a complex work process, appeals to human emotions, and influence buying decisions.

The research by Psychology Today points that a person opts for video content only when it doesn’t require decision-making. But when dealing with a serious matter – financial, insurance, or purchasing – most people will choose texts.

Any thoughts?

Lesley J. Vos

Lesley is a web writer behind PlagiarismCheck. A regular contributor to publications on content creation, digital marketing, and productivity, she doesn't forget to polish her writing skills, read non-fiction books, and travel over the hills and far away.